Moths Invaded Our Pantry…Bugs Like Real Food, Too!

I briefly shared this on Facebook a couple weeks ago, but in case you missed it here’s the deal. Moths moved into our pantry and it was not pretty. Bugs in general kind of give me the “heebie jeebies” so I thought the whole thing was quite disturbing actually. And as we were clearing house and tossing out just about every non-perishable food item we owned I said to my husband, ”This is happening because we eat real food isn’t it?” Those moths were all up on our raw nuts, seeds, dried fruit, and other whole foods. They did eventually invade some non-food items as well, but let’s face it…for the most part bugs are after the same nutrients we are!

It Starts with Just One

So this is how it happened. One day – longer ago than I’d like to admit – I opened our pantry and one moth flew out. I didn’t think much of it (mistake #1). Who doesn’t deal with a pesky housefly or fruit fly on occasion? I thought this was one and the same. As time went on I noticed that this “moth flying out of the pantry” business was happening more frequently than it probably should. Then (thank goodness for social media) I saw another Facebook page mention they had unexplained moths in their pantry as well. The commenters shared that moths can move in and camp out, and in some cases you’ll need to get rid of everything. Yes, they were speaking of the items we were currently cooking with and eating…yikes!

So I tried to walk and not run straight to our pantry to start investigating. The first thing I found was a bag of unopened almonds that was getting more action (i.e. different moth lifecycle stages) than I care to disclose. I would have taken a picture, but I was so grossed out I could barely even look straight at it with my own eyes. Plus I was overwhelmed with the need to purge it immediately…after some screaming of course! That’s when my husband got involved. He started inspecting our “nut basket” and basically did a thorough clean out of just those items and we moved on (mistake #2)…eeeek!

The Clean Out

Moth inside plastic sesame seed container with screw top lid

After that my husband put some handy dandy non-toxic traps up in the pantry just to be sure we were in the clear. But, oh it wasn’t pretty. The trap was racking up those bad boys (a dozen or so in a week’s time) so we knew there was still trouble. That’s when we decided to clean out every single item we owned. As you can imagine this was an all day super fun process. And what we found was infestation beyond the nut basket. Yep they had made nice little homes in sunflower seeds, raisins, muffin liners, and even the plastic brackets holding up our shelves. I learned that quite a lot of our Facebook followers had been through this before, and I appreciate them encouraging us to inspect EVERYTHING. And rather than leafing through 200 4-ply napkins we chose to get rid of everything. The thing is if we were to miss something we could possibly have to go through all of this again! So my philosophy was better safe than sorry…

Once the pantry was completely empty we cleaned, cleaned, and cleaned even more including spraying the wall corners and shelf brackets with vinegar and vacuuming off the tops of cookbooks. One good thing is that most of our flours/grains are stored in the freezer and our herbs/spices are kept in a drawer away from the pantry. It would have been even worse if we lost all of those items as well. Then the next thing we did was buy truly air-tight glass containers from Sur La Table (both the reasonably priced Fido and the more expensive but wider mouthed Le Parfait varieties). We owned quite a few plastic containers (seen in “before” picture above) that were advertised as “air tight,” but guess what I found inside one of them…yep! A moth pupa case, to be specific. So we got rid of those as well. And we got rid of the brown baskets (that we were storing containers of nuts and seeds in) realizing there were too many little crevices and that all surfaces needed to be wipeable for easy cleaning and inspecting!

So what started as a single moth flying out of our pantry ended up being a very disruptive and expensive problem. Fingers crossed they don’t come back (many have told me they thought they were in the clear then a month later…surprise!). And I guess if I were to look on the bright side of all of this I’d have to say my pantry is looking much better and more organized than it used to be. We got the white bucket containers from Ikea and all the air-tight glass jars from Sur La Table (the can also be ordered from Amazon). It will be a while before we can/will fully stock everything again with all the food we lost though…baby steps. :)

How to Avoid Moths in Your Pantry (Prevention is Key)!

So now here’s a little more of a “technical” explanation from my husband on what to look for and how to ensure your pantry stays moth-free! …

Lisa thinks I’m an expert on all things mechanical, electrical, chemical, biological…well, just about anything ending in ‘al’ it seems! I’ll neither confirm nor deny that, but I will say entomology is not my strong suit. Regardless, I did learn a lot through our ordeal that I’d like to share with you. Please read on even if you think you have no signs of moths in your household, as prevention is the best approach!

First up – where did the moths come from? It’s technically possible they flew in through an open back door, but the much more likely scenario is that they entered the house through some infected dry goods purchased from the grocery store. By infected I mean the product, likely nuts or dried fruit, contained moth eggs, larvae, or both. Once in the confines of our home the moths hatched and made sweet moth love, resulting in more moths, eggs, and larvae – in our food. Now I’ve actually eaten silk and bamboo worms in Thailand on purpose, so this didn’t gross me out that much. But it did NOT bode well with Lisa, at all.

Who Knew Home Cooks Would Need to Understand the Moth Life Cycle?

Picture provided by Safer® Brand

So let’s talk about the moth life cycle, which you need to understand if you ever hope to rid yourself of these pests or prevent them from setting up shop in your pantry in the first place. The duration of the cycle varies depending on conditions, but five generations per year is typical and the whole cycle can take as little as a month. Adult females lay around 100 to 400 eggs on or near food, and 2-14 days later the larvae hatch out and begin feeding. When mature, the larvae seek out a happy place by crawling with their little legs (usually to wall/ceiling junctions or other crevices) and transform into light-brown pupae, often within silk webbing. They remain stationary in this stage for 2-3 weeks as they go through metamorphosis, and then the adult moth emerges. Since adults don’t feed (their only purpose is to mate), they only live for 1-2 weeks.

Whether you think you have moths or not, you need to get a pheromone trap (non-toxic) and put it in your pantry ASAP. The adult males are lured into the trap by pheromone bait (mimicking the allure of a female) where they get stuck in the glue and die. Even if you don’t think you have a problem, this can be your canary in the coalmine. You can buy two traps for about $9 on Amazon (my local big box stores were out), and once opened they last for about 3 months. I plan on having one in our pantry at all times now. Trust me, $18 a year is nothing compared to the costs of lost productivity and wasted food associated with clearing out these pests. It really is a pain.

But you can’t just kill adult moths and think you’re good. By the time you notice them, you may have multiple generations in play at different points in the life cycle. You’ve got to break the cycle to rid yourself of the pests. And adults can fly all over the house, so your problem could spread to other areas.

If You Have Pantry Moths Here’s What You Have to Do, Step by Step:

Pull EVERYTHING out of your pantry and any other food storage areas in your kitchen.

Anything that is not sealed in a can, glass jar, or other airtight, hard container (they can chew through plastic bags and cardboard containers) needs to be thrown away (outside!). Wipe clean all sides of the cans and air-tight containers. If you keep an electric broom in your pantry like we do, empty the refuse tray and clean it.

Inspect and clean or throw out anything else even if it’s not food (we seriously had bugs that had eaten through an unopened plastic bag to lay eggs on plastic cupcake stencils!). I know it seems wasteful, but you might end up doing it all over again otherwise. Note: Don’t just move items to a different location until you have time to inspect them because the moths could find a home in that new spot, too!

Thoroughly clean your empty pantry, paying special attention to crevices. Moths can lay eggs in shelf brackets, wall corners, and even on the top of cookbooks. Be sure to wipe all surfaces several times.

If you don’t have them already, purchase air-tight storage containers for your dry food, such as these jars. We will most likely never again keep a box of crackers or pasta or rice in our pantry without transferring it to an air-tight container first.

Since your infestation probably came from package goods, it is imperative that you put new dry goods (including dried fruit) into airtight containers as soon as you get home from shopping. Edit: Some readers have suggested placing dry goods from the store in the freezer to kill eggs/larvae before placing them in the pantry (in sealed containers of course!) I’ve read here that this works but 4-7 days in the freezer is required. Thanks readers for the tip! This means put your bag of rice in a jar, even if the bag is unopened (remember they can eat through plastic bags and cardboard). If you bring in any contaminated food, it will at least be confined to the container, and if you use clear jars you can observe the food before opening the jars. This also serves to seal away food sources, so if you do have some larvae hatch, they’ll starve and the life cycle will be broken. Don’t mess around with these moths. Good luck!

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Ugh, I feel for you! Bugs are the creepiest things on the planet. I think your ‘real foods’ theory is flawed though – we had ants in our pantry two years ago and the ONLY thing they went for was the cheez-its. Literally, they made a straight line marching for the cheez-its. Suffice it to say, I’ve never been able to look at another cheez-it! (Which is probably a blessing in disguise).

Hi Alex. You can use plastic containers as long as it seals completely, though we do recommend going BPA free. We like glass as it does not absorb odors or stains and its pretty…but it is certainly not required. ;) ~Amy

I had a moth fly out of a brand new oatmeal canister about a year ago. I killed it and took the whole canister straight to the dumpster like a crazy person. I thought at the time that I might have overreacted, but Better safe than sorry. Gross!

Lisa, we had this happen in our pantry. That is how I found your blog. I followed your reccomendations, and it worked. It also helps with organization and spending less at the grocery store. We recently moved, and it was so easy to move my pantry to the new house.Friends are telling me how organized I am. Thank you for all the good information and support.

Pantry moths are really cunning; I have had 3 infestations in the last 30 years, so here are some tips.
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Pantry moths can get into EVERY THING, I have even found a cocoon in a VCR tape.

Moths will rarely get into any thing that is powder, like flour, they prefer rice, as there are breathing spaces.

The larger of the moths are the females, the small ones who flit around are the males, doing their mating dance. I got a butterfly net at the dollar store and made the net longer and have gotten quite good at catching them. The females will land on the walls and ceiling and you have to put the net under them, as soon as they are touched, they will fall down. You can then either skrunch them with your hand or step on them while they are still in the net. The males are easiest to catch when they are in the air, as they don’t fall down when touched.

Bird seed is the biggest culprit in bringing moths into the house, although large amounts of any pet food can bring them in, as well as other products that have thin packaging. Bird seed can be sifted as the eggs and larve are small and will fall through the sieve.

It is not the moth that eats through the plastic but the larve. The moth lays the eggs on the bag and the larve chew through the bag to get to the food, so they can grow. The moth usually lays the eggs at the bottom of the food container, and the larve crawl up. They are very tiny at this point and can crawl in a screw top jar, and even a tupperware container.

Last tip – use Press n Seal on the top of any food container between the container and the lid. Make sure that it sticks to the top of the container creating a seal. The seal can be used a number of times before it needs to be replaced. Using this method, I have found cocoons in the lowest part of the screw on lid, but never inside the jar. It doesn’t matter if the container is plastic or glass, this method will work. You can also use this method to quarantine new foods, or food that you have checked and want to protect, or even foods that are suspect and you want to set apart.

Lisa, have you used any of the glass jars from The Container Store? We have moths from birdseed, and I had the same plastic co takers that were supposed to be airtight, but weren’t. I’m getting ready to do a total pantry clean out. I’m also wondering if your girls have access to the pa try on their own. My daughter is 10, but has a tendency to drop or run into things. She serves herself from the fridge and pantry a lot, and I’m worried about her dropping the jars.

Hi Kay. As long as the containers seal completely, they should work well. My boys handle all the glass with a little more care but occasional things get dropped. I use mostly various sized ball jars and they have proven pretty hardy. I think most storage glass is built to be tough. :) However, you could always use some BPA-free plastic containers for frequently used and heavy items. ~Amy

I traced our moth infestation to when I purchased a large 10lb bag of rice from costco. the bag wasn’t even opened and there were a lot of moths inside! Before that episode, can’t say we ever had pantry moths inside our new house. :(

I read your post years ago when it happened to you and know it has happened to us!! We have the traps but I am not sure we are using them correctly. I dropped the red square onto the glue area and then set them on several shelves. We haven’t caught any but have found a handful on the walls. What do you do with the traps?

Hi Kathy. You just leave the traps in place but if you still have moths appearing, you may need to do some deeper investigation/cleaning. Lisa keeps traps in her pantry all the time now for prevention’s sake.

I used to work in a cookie factory. I was in Quality Assurance. The manager of QA would be called out to inspect the big (4-ft x 4-ft x 4-ft) cardboard boxes that would come in from the warehouse full of oats or whatever…because they’d have mouse turds or worse on the plastic bags inside the Gaylords. Ugggg. Sometimes the food would get tossed and sometimes it would pass inspection. We also had storage areas for the finished product (we had to retain a sample every day in case of future recalls…) that were just crawling with grain beetles. Used to just ook me right out. Pretty much *all* food can be contaminated at any point along the harvesting-processing-selling line of travel, and it’s not anything you caused, it just is. After working there for awhile I became pretty anal about keeping some stuff (nuts, especially) in the freezer til I use or eat them. Nothing like biting into a shelled walnut and then seeing something crawling in the bag after it’s already in your mouth. :-(

Lisa, what are you now storing flour in? We buy up to 20 pound bag of rice and 5 or 10 pound bags of flour….and haven’t found the ideal container. In the middle of a horrible infestation. Our glass containers with the silicone lined lids did not work. Bugs got into the glass-lock type containers too!

I see this comment question was asked a long time ago but in case you’re still looking for ideas, or if this could help someone else….
I keep my bulk flour in “vittles vault” containers. They are air tight and actually made for pet food but they are food grade plastic and work great! Many sizes available.

I use Mason jars of various sizes to store all my dry goods. Overall, they are less expensive that other “air-tight” containers and if you own a vacuum sealer and the lid fittings, you can seal those jars real tight. Nothing can survive without air!

So helpful!!! I just noticed recently that I had an infestation. Luckily, we are currently gutting our kitchen, so we will be starting off fresh and new. But, this article was really helpful, because I hadn’t thrown away any of the unopened nuts, pasta, etc. I am doing that immediately, so I don’t face this issue in my new pantry. Thank you so much for this helpful advice!

This happened to us several years ago. These moths love nuts and even went after the nuts in some of my chocolate. We found our culprit to be some bird food we were keeping in a plastic (not airtight) container, it was literally swarming. Bird is now in the freezer and all dry good are in airtight storage containers. What a mess.

Cannot believe I just read this blog yesterday…and today I opened a brand new bag of dog food, and moths flew out! Thankfully, I was outside and I took it straight to the trash! And, luckily it had been stored in the garage where there isn’t any other food. I went back to the pet store to get a new bag and it turns out they are infested. Moths flying around the store. I got a refund and bought more dog food somewhere else. I still have the heebie jeebies and will be on the lookout inside. So glad I read this!

Thanks for this information. It helped so much! Besides helping us to get rid of the moths it made us feel so much better that we were not alone! We are pretty sure that our moths came from bird food which we now keep in an air tight container. We also no longer buy bags of just sunflower seeds. It seems to be the moths’ favorite.

If you see webbing in your bird seed or pet food, you will likely have pantry moths. Often times the webbing is quicker to spot. And cocoons can be found under shelf paper or wallpaper. The caterpillars crawl away from the food source to pupate.

Yup this happened to us. It was not fun. Once I cleared everything, new glass containers etc. They were back, I couldn’t understand it.. Then I found the nest in my garage. Apparently if you take food away they go to the next thing with is any cardboard box or paper for that matter! Still dealing with these darn pantry moths. Better luck to you.

I had moths a few years ago – came in a box of dog treats.
Used the traps from Garden Alive – threw out everything in the pantry = cleaned three times then spayed with vinegar.
As I replaced items in the pantry I put bay leaves in the containers and in all the corners of the cabinets.
Got them again! I left a new package of walnuts on the counter to use the next day and found there were moths in the sealed bag.
Even tho there was nothing in the flour I threw out everything. Got four moths traps. (two from Garden Alive and two from Amazon. The ones from Amazon are useless – only two months in a month. GA’s are full and I ordered more. I now have four traps all over the house.
The moths are every where – in the bath tub – even in my denture cup. There are in my fabric stash – which is all 100% cotton. They fly right by the traps and fly at me when I working at the computer. They are all over the walls and ceilings have to use the vacuum. Even found one on a bay leave I had tucked in the hem of the kitchen curtains.
Read that it takes a month to get rid of them – but it has been eight weeks since I ordered the first set of traps.

I am having a really hard time getting rid of my cupboard moths too. Unfortunately, it is usually my 13 yr old son who finds the larvae – in his cereal, on his water bottle, on his bowl. Yuck. They seem to like chocolate best in my house. An unopened box of Godiva chocolate was swarming with larvae. I have now completely emptied the cupboard and taken out all of the shelves. They are mostly between the shelves and the wall, which is why I didn’t find them before. I sprayed everything with vinegar and threw out a lot of food. I keep my rice and other grains in the freezer. What a nightmare. I am going to order some traps today!

Oh my! So happy to follow your site and remembered this post. We discovered pesky moths in our pantry Friday evening. We took everything out, wiped it down, put in the traps, tossed and tossed some more. I then vacuumed and wiped down the shelves with bleach water. I even cleaned out each of the little holes that the shelving slides into. I thought for sure there was no way we could possibly see anymore and then lo and behold Saturday night I come home to find one sitting on the shelf. Thankfully, I hadn’t put anything back in. This leads me to ask, how will I know when it’s safe to put things back in? Is there a good waiting period or trial and error? many thanks!

It can be really hard to know unless you are absolutely positive you’ve gotten all the eggs out of the nooks and crannies. This happened to a friend recently and she used a combination of boric acid and Diatomaceous Earth powder as a back up after the traps.

I just found a bunch of larvae living in my dish towel/pot holder drawer at our vacation home! Most of the older towels went into the trash; a few newer/favorites into the wash. Haven’t found any in our food, though.

We had them several years ago in our island. We had to take the top off (which we ended up damaging), pulling all the drawers out and spraying everything down with vinegar. We were picking into all the little crevices using skewers to get the worms out. It was a mess! Based on what we had in the island, and the fact that a lot of the food was in Tupperware containers, we believe they came into the house on a bag of rice. Even though most of the food was in Tupperware, if I saw any signs of them near the containers the food was tossed out. I did not want to take any chances. It was awful!!!!

This article includes some great info! I use a different brand of non-toxic moth traps, and have gotten some super helpful tips from their entomologists on eradicating and preventing in a non-toxic manner. Check out some of their best tips on getting rid of pantry moths here https://www.greenwaytraps.com/foodMoths.php

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